Here's my comfy photo. Thanks to Daisy for inspiring the post. Comfy for me is in my kitchen (in my pajamas) cooking some comfort food. This one is curried squash soup from last fall. I think the squash was named Bruno. Don't get too comfy with me. I might cook you for supper.

On our camping trip this summer, my dad told me he thinks I'm an introvert, telling myself I'm and extravert. I've been thinking about this. He says if I was really an extravert I wouldn't write poetry.

I've been thinking about this comment, and my own sense of ease in my life, and I'm wondering a lot about it. I think there is some truth in what he says. We agreed that very few people are one thing or another. We're all lots of different things, and for each measure. In this case it ranges from extreme introvert to extreme extrovert, with all kinds of calibrations in between. Further, a person could be inclined differently in different situations and life phases, while basically being one way in general.

I think I live the life of an extravert. I don't take/have/demand a lot of solo time. I do crave it, and I find it in my own ways - during my blogging time, in which I entertain myself with myself, and in the car (that's when I sing, recite poetry and sometimes cry) and probably when I exercise, now that I think about it. Even in the cycle class, once the endorphins kick in, I zone out and take a private thought expedition quite frequently. hmmm

During the course of a normal, busy day, I am surrounded by people at home and at work, and in my leisure life. I thrive on laughter, intellectual stimulation, attention, appreciation and enjoyment of friends and family. It feeds me. I seek it out, build my life to get as much as I can and do as much as I can. Mostly it is very satisfying. I am blessed with good physical and mental health and abundant energy that allows this high level of interaction and activity. I go for it almost all of the time.

I think part of my resistance to acknowledging the other side of myself comes from being snobbish about jumping on pop-culture waves. So I am resisting the "simplicity" movement and everyone who says they're looking for "balance." Even if these are good things, I don't like to join in the mantra of the masses chanting precious platitudes about this year's version of how to live the inner life.

But that other side is there, even if I don't refer to it in terms of balance. It's the part of me that wears pajamas until the last possible moment when I have somewhere to go. It's the part that carries a book around in my briefcase so I can hide in a corner and read, even for five minutes when the opportunity arises. It's the part that writes poetry, blogs and actually loves doctor's waiting rooms, buses and long car rides. At its heart, it wants its very own quiet place to be alone for indefinite periods of time.

So if I refuse to look for "balance," maybe I'll just have to think about this part as a partly overlooked part of myself, talk to it once in a while and find out what it needs and what it can do for me. Hey there intro-self. What's up?

Thursday, September 28, 2006

A friend at work is creating an art installation consisting of photographs of cats and dogs wearing hats. She has sent us home with little straw hats in which to photograph our friendly beasts. Your dog or cat (or hamster, budgie, gerbil etc) could be part of this work of art. Just send your picture to me by Canadian Thanksgiving (October 9) and I will forward it to the artist. The display will be at the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts in Burnaby and I'll let you know the dates later.

I think I just found my New Year's Resolution. Before you start thinking, "How Type-A can she get?" I'm not trying to be super-organized or fix myself. At least not with this impulse. September has always seemed like more of a new year to me than January. More people start more new things and more cycles of activity commence in September than ever do in January. Maybe I won't even bother with a New Year's resolution when January rolls around.

If you know me you also know that I like New Year's resolutions that add something rather than take something away. I am not into denial and deprivation. I prefer enhancement.

Yesterday I watched another movie from the foreign movies section of our local video store. I enjoyed it so much I think I'm going to try to work my way through those movies and any others that I come across. That's my resolution. Watch more foreign movies. They're mostly rentable in packs of 3 for $9 for a whole week, so it'll probably be in binges. Heck, I might even go to the theatre to see some.

Yesterday I watched Osama. It's a movie made in Afghanistan about a family living during the time that the Taliban were in power. In the story, a young girl who is made to dress as a boy so that she may go outside the home to support her mother and grandmother after her father and uncle die. The movie was filmed in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban regime. The actors are local people who the director found there and asked to be part of the project. As I watched it, the stark landscape and constant menace of the Taliban made me keep thinking I was watching science fiction. But I knew it was a true story, that represented the reality of the lives of the Afghani people in Kabul during the time of the Taliban. I kept thinking that it is impossible that in one world, life can be so different for people. We are all the same, but our lives are not.

I watched the movie at 5:30 in the morning. I think that I can find a day here and a day there to do this. Seeing the work of film-makers from different places in our world will help wake up my mind and heart to new worlds.

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

We've been extremely busy at the office since I came back from holidays, but mostly busy in a fun and productive way with a bit of manic black humour thrown in. We have this mechanical angel in the back office. When we're at a loss for how to handle things we can push a button and she gives us a platitude. The other days she said, "Keep your temper. No one else wants it," in this kind of Stepford Wife voice. She cracks us all up.

When I left for vacation I knew that when I got back, I would have a report to write for a public meeting. I write this same report every year, so I know how to do it. I have to ask about 25 people to send me data. I compile it all in a nice chart, write a summarizing cover page, and Bob's your uncle. I even thought to ask for approval to submit it to the October meeting (rather than September), seeing as I took holidays later than usual this summer, at the end of August.

So a couple weeks back I emailed everyone asking them to send me the usual stats and trends, but this year's version. I reckoned that I'd have a week to work on it, an hour here and there and get it in to my boss in plenty of time to be edited, formatted and sent out to the official people a week before the meeting. What I forgot to do was to verify the due date. I had some hazy idea it would be in the first week of October.

wrong

Yesterday my boss leaves me a message saying I need to have the complete report in by Wednesday (tomorrow). I felt sick. Not only had I not even begun compiling the information, I knew I was missing more than half of the data. Missing it is usual. I just call around and people say, "oh yeah, I'll email it to you today," and I get it all together in plenty of time. But there was NO time, this time.

So I holed up in my office like some drama-bureaucrat, took no incoming calls and commenced to track everyone down and badger them FOR THE DATA - RIGHT NOW! LIKE, IN THE NEXT HOUR IF POSSIBLE. Boy did I feel like the Nag Hag of the Universe. I was bugging secretaries to chase people out of meetings and leaving double voicemails with backup emails. I think I have not been as obnoxious at work in the last 10 years put together as I was today (well, there was that time I tried to convince everyone to wear Christmas pants to the office party, but that was just silly obnoxious - today I was bossy obnoxious). I was totally embarassed at how I was being. Then in the middle of it, I get a voicemail and an email from my boss. Crunchy Crap! She needs the report "pretty much perfect and ready to go" by mid-afternoon TODAY!!!!

So I went out and pushed the button on the angel and she told me to "Count your blessings. No one else wants them," which didn't make sense but I think maybe I was a more than a bit off-balance by this point.

Anyway, I tracked down everyone, and some of them called me back, and I got the damn thing done. It is not the most polished or creative piece of work I have ever submitted, but it's done. And tomorrow I will start making it up to everyone who hopped right to it and got me THE DATA NOW! when I asked/pestered/demanded. And next year I will confirm the due date before I go on vacation, then build in time so I can ask people nicely for more info, or the info that they owed me yesterday, but there's no problem, plenty of time.

I think the angel might properly say, "You made your own bed. Now lie in it. Nobody else wants you lobbing pillows at their heads." And she'd be right.

Alex drove into Vancouver to Playland for his student driver practice today. He cashed in his skee-ball tickets from the whole summer and we took a couple of rides on The Coaster before heading home (one in the front for the best view, one near the back for the noise and the rush and the whip-around-corners).

Now that we're back from our California coaster trip I can say with assurance that nothing anywhere I have been beats this ride. In particular, the two other wooden coasters we rode in California (Colossus at Magic Mountain and Ghost Rider at Knott's) don't come near to it. Both rides were bigger and more complicated, but they lacked the grace of our wonderful wooden coaster. Our version is every bit as fast and swoopy, with lower-tech seat restraints so more off-the-seat time on hills. Most important, it's smooth. I think someone decided that wooden coasters are supposed to rattle your bones right out of your body to be good. They're wrong. Playland's Coaster knocks your socks off, but leaves your teeth in your mouth, your breasts in your bra and your brain un-concussed. I like it the best.

We had our Shoreline Chapbook group meeting last night at Helmi's place. Supper is always a free-form potluck. It usually turns out very well, partly because Helmi always has a main course and her perfect corn fritters, plus a dessert, so we could pretty much bring nothing and have something. I like surprise potlucks. Planning and committing to bring a specific dish just don't work for me because I'm never sure what I'll feel like, how much time I'll have and what's good on the day of the potluck.

I do have a hang-up about potlucks. I am always afraid that nobody will bring vegetables. I have got over most of my unhealthy food rules/limitations but a meal without veg filling half the plate is something I dislike intensely. I can't enjoy the yummy other stuff unless there's a load of veg to balance it. And the veg has to be yummy too. An iceberg lettuce salad from a styro takeout box does not count. Nor does a veggie platter unless there's something unusual and nice about it.

As a result of this obsession, I always bring veggies to potlucks. Sometimes a big salad with real lettuce and other delightful ingredients, sometimes something cooked. Last night I found eggplants looking like gifts from heaven at the produce store so I made a really easy and simple and yummy eggplant and mixed-veg casserole. Here's the recipe in case you are going to a potluck.

1 big mama egglplant - you could use 1 or 2 of the long Japanese kind if they look better1 big red onionas much garlic as you like2 handfulls of fresh mushrooms2 red or yellow or orange bell peppers1 plumpish zucchini2 handfuls of ripe tomatoes

Wash and cut up the vegetables into big chunks. Toss the zucchini and bell pepper and eggplant pieces in olive oil and roast them in a 450F oven for about 15 minutes, turning to brown both sides. When the corners of the peppers start to get toasty it's time to take everything out.

Meanwhile, saute the onion and garlic and mushrooms just until they let go of their crispiness.

Let the tomatoes sit on the side and toss them in after everything else is cooked. The heat of the other veggies is enough to cook them a bit without turning them to mush.

Throw everything into a big casserole (3-4 litres). Stir in about 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar or red wine if you don't have the vinegar. Season with salt, pepper and oregano, or whatever you think will make it taste nice. Keep it simple.

Sprinkle feta cheese over the top. Take it to the potluck just like that.

When you get there you can stick it in the oven (about 350) until everyone's ready to eat or nuke it in the microwave for about 10 minutes to fully reheat, just before serving.

Friday, September 22, 2006

Today I booked off work to be with the kids who have a Pro D Days (the teachers are in workshops and the kids stay home from school). We had a screaming hot Szechuan lunch, practice driving for Alex and two movies. Before breakfast this morning I curled up on the couch with Elling (made in Norway, 2001) which took my breath away and activated my laughing and crying mechanisms in turn. It is a beautiful movie. I have just discovered a pretty impressive foreign movie section in the Kensington Square Rogers Video in North Burnaby. A movie with breakfast is a wonderful treat. I will be visiting Rogers and bringing home breakfast movies as frequently as I can.

After the Szechuan we went to the multi-googolplex. Fi and her friend watched Barnyard. Alex was going to see The Black Dahlia, but I talked him into seeing Little Miss Sunshine with me. (I reminded him that going to see Napoleon Dynamite was my idea before all the kids at school had caught on to it). We both loved it.

I have to give up the computer now, but it's just as well I don't give the plot away in some awkwardly enthusiastic review. Just go see that movie. And rent Elling if you're tired of reading the newspaper with breakfast.

Our City Council in Port Moody has struck a task force to work on projects around the Olympic Games - scheduled for Winter 2010 in Vancouver. Oh, I'm sorry, did I say Olympic? I mean "The Games." Oh! did I say 2010? I mean 2009+1.

The VANOC has declared exclusive rights to the words "Olympic" and "2010." Our city's group was ordered by VANOC's lawyers to rename itself and destroy its letterhead when it first launched as the Port Moody 2010 Olympics Task Force. Don't worry, the mayor says he will cut the letterhead up and use if for notepads. The task force has been renamed "The Games Legacy Task Force." Now the Olympic Committee's lawyer is busy pursuing the holdouts "Olympic Pizza," "Olympic Powerwashing," and a few homeowners who are unfortunate to have the address "2010 whatever street."

Several other proactive suggestions so we stay out of trouble until after the games are over:

banks can develop brochures to help people learn what to write on their cheques for the entire year of 2010, when it's illegal to write "2010." If you don't like "2009+1" try "the year that cannot be named."

Washington State can have a referendum to rename the Olympic Mountain Range and the Olympic Peninsula.

We can go on using the word "Olympic" but transpose the vowels to make it substantially different and annoy VANOC at the same time. This should be used in reference to the actual games as frequently as possible - "Ilompycs" or "Ylimpocs" both sound rather sassy.

We can go out and raise a ton of money for "The Games" and "The Legacy" then take it to the VANOC office and say "NOT THOSE GAMES! NOT IN A MILLION YEARS - OR AT LEAST NOT IN 2011-1 YEARS!!

Thursday, September 21, 2006

Coming up this Sunday in Vancouver it's Word on the Street. I'll be there helping at Poet's Corner all day. It's a great event, a huge, free, outdoor (mostly) celebration of books, magazines, writing and word-sharing. I hope to see you there.

Tuesday, September 19, 2006

I keep thinking about the label "aging rock star" and thinking, "what the heck does that mean?" And just to clarify, I am really asking myself that question, not just asking it rhetorically here as a way to say something little and make it sound more important.

I've been thinking about where the lines are that define young, aging, old. We all begin to age the minute we are conceived and we keep aging at the same rate throughout our lives. It's just that there is a line, and when we cross it, our age is in the "getting older" category, rather than the "in the first part" category. I won't use the "you are as old as you feel/act" platitude. We are, chronologically and biologically aging. What I may disagree with is people's concept of what we should be doing/thinking/feeling at a certain age, although there are some broad guidelines that usually work.

Getting back to what aging means and when it's appropriate to categorize someone as aging. I think usually it's in the second half of their life. I'll be 45 this fall which means that I will be aging, except that several of my female relatives have lived well past 90, my grandma past 100, so maybe by that definition I'm not quite aging.

Aging might also depend on the context. For example, a beauty queen or supermodel could be aging when she's 27. A physics professor wouldn't be aging until she was at least 50. And categories that are defined by generations could have a reverse effect imposed. A 60 year old grandmother is "a young grandmother" in my books.

What prompted this all in my thinking was thinking of the Red Hot Chili Peppers as aging. I think of them as aging because they are about my age. They've been playing since the 80s. They are most likely all in the second half of their lives. They are older than most of their fans too, I'd guess. They're not in the same category as Mick Jagger or Rod Stewart. Some aging rock stars exceed all expectation. I suspect it happens when you have lots of wives and kids. You can't afford to stop being a rock star.

Aging is not a bad thing, in my books anyway. There are lots of advantages to aging. People take you more seriously, and you stop taking yourself so seriously. It gets easier to do your own thing because you've tried lots of things and figured out at least some of what you want to do. You can still do most of the things that you like to do. In the aging category the body still works, the brain's alert, you usually have some money and you have lots of friends and experiences and choices. You've had time to get good at some things that make you feel a sense of purpose. There's been time for spiritual/intellectual/artistic exploration. There's still lots of time to do a lot more. These days, there's a long time between "aging" and "old." The beginning of "aging" is a pretty good place to be.

Saturday, September 16, 2006

I saw the Red Hot Chili Peppers on Thursday in Vancouver with my friend Vicky. She's the one who introduced me to this band while I was doing my big "listening to music" project a couple of years ago. I now have a pretty good CD collection that tickles my happy-music-self with strong lyrics, mostly acoustic sound, some kind of sense of humour/quirkiness and all kinds of styles/genres/eras. I keep asking to borrow my friends' music, and now I have some I can loan back, so it's fun. I'm listening to the radio less, and to music of my own choice more.

So when the Chili Peppers announced their concert tour I was over the moon. Tickets sold out in less than an hour, but I got a couple of seats up in a section where I can verify, those guys still have all of their own hair. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

After a salad and a glass of wine in Burnaby, Vic and I began our concert experience with a Skytrain ride downtown. Neither of us has been to a concert in a while (well, I saw Jann Arden a couple of years ago at the Queen E but this is something different altogether). Neither of us has gone to the earsplitting/stadium filling/rock-music/maybe see our friends' kids there and wish we didn't kind of show. The skytrain was packed with 20-somethings including a young couple smash-face-smooching about 2 inches from my face all the way from Broadway station. Now that was funny. When they came up for air we talked with them about the concert. They seemed like nice kids.

The crowd at the stadium was pretty young. Not so many buying beer. Lots smoking pot in their seats. By the midway through the show, the air was blue and thick and we were dying for water. The nice young man beside me offered to share his marijuana with us. Vic and I are the only ones our age left in the world who have never smoked pot, ever, not even a little bit, so we grinned and declined. We probably smoked a fair bit just breathing up there.

But the show. Well, first on was The Mars Volta, which was hard for me to understand and enjoy because I have never heard of them or heard their music. The were a big group - maybe 8 or 9 on stage. High energy, but they were squished into the front quarter of the stage by their equipment setup. They played about 4 exceedingly long songs in one hour and I couldn't hear what they were saying or singing. I think that the backup band must have limitations put on what they are allowed to do and how good their technical support is, so it's not fair to judge by this performance. If found out some encouraging stuff when I looked them up later. Their new CD is produced by Rick Rubin, who has produced a few of the Chili Peppers albums, including Stadium Arcadium. Also, Flea and John Frusciante, the bass and guitar players for the Peppers have mentored The Mars Volta, played with them, and have toured with them before. So I think they're worth a listen again. And I got a peek at some of their talent at the end of the show, but more about that later. I read on the band's website about the sources for their songs and concept albums, and noticed they had this cloth screen backdrop with sci-fi type images projected during their show, so I don't know if I'll get the references when I do listen. Oh well.

After about an hour of opening act and another half hour of setting up the stage the Chili Peppers came on. Everyone went wild. We were on our feet enjoying the music and singing along for most of the show. The sound was good, and they played a ton of favourites, about half from their new CD Stadium Arcadium and half from previous albums. The did sing "Can't Stop," "Scar Tissue," "Dani California" and "Californication." They didn't sing the Zephyr Song or Under the Bridge (the latter of which I missed more). I really wished they sang their version of Higher Ground. But they didn't. Flea was flamboyant and exuberant. He ended the show by walking off the stage on his hands. I couldn't figure out what he was wearing. Some skin-tight pants and shirt combo with big sneakers with red laces. The outfit was all-over patterned so it looked like he was dipped in a comic book page and came up coated with primary colour images and scribbles. I kept wondering if the shirt was a tattoo but I'm pretty sure it was a shirt. Anthony Keidis, the lead singer was clear and engaging, and he has very shiny hair. He seemed to enjoy the crowd's response, but he didn't chat much between songs. I wondered about his costume choice - sweatshirt capris and a long tank-top that stopped in the wrong place and made him look hippy - which I've never seen on a guy. He looked like I do when I put put on slouchy old clothes to clean the house. John Frusciante, on the other hand, was elegant in a slate blue velvet pants and jacket. And boy can he play the guitar. That was probably the best thing about the concert for me, hearing him play. Chad Smith, the drummer had his usual bandana-band and an aqua button-shirt. I thought about what I would wear if I was an aging rock star. Hmmm, maybe manpris and a comic book shirt, but probably the velvet suit. It was kind of retro. The lights and effects were very cool. Just before the show, 4 camera operators climbed up to a catwalk over the stage and tethered themselves there for the whole show. Amazing closeup images of faces and fingers were projected in a shifting image montage. That was good.

Enough about their clothes. The playing and singing was good, but I was really bugged by one thing, and I'm not sure if this is just what musicians do at concerts or if it was them. Leading into songs, Flea and John did a bit of jamming with their guitar and bass. It was nice sometimes, especially when it sounded like they were having a conversation with their instruments, but it got out of hand (I think) during the encore. For the encore they sang "Give it Away," then they want into an extended wank-jam that lasted for about 20 minutes. They were joined by Omar Rodriguez-Lopez, the guitarist from The Mars Volta, and he was very good. For about 5 minutes it was fun to watch. Then it kept going, and going and going. Vic said "Let's leave" but I was hopeful that they'd wind up with something that might indicate communication with the audience. Instead they all huddled up in front of the drumset and played for each other. I guess if I was an aspiring young musician I might have enjoyed fantasizing that this would be what it's like to jam with them. Or if I had a finer-tuned appreciating for guitar and bass playing I would have found it a privilege to witness the creative process. But it got boring, then they wound up and finished boom-boom-twang. Then they left (except Flea stayed and walked on his hands for a minute). That was disappointing.

After the show we smashed back into the Skytrain. We were deaf for a little while and we definitely smelled a lot like marijuana, and also Axe body spray, which was the second prevalent scent during the show. We agreed that it was a good concert on the whole, and a boggling experience of something we've been missing for a while.

So that was the concert.

question: what would you wear for a show if you were an aging rock star?

mompoet - logging off to clean my bathrooms (but not in a blue velvet suit)

Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Monday, September 11, 2006

We're back, and while the camera is not talking to the computer I'll draw you a couple of pictures with words.

The place we stayed in - a house on the Sunshine Coast of BC - was the nicest we've ever had. Its foundation was on a big rock perched out into the ocean. There was a rocky beach, water view on three sides, big windows, a huge deck, hot tub, luxurious beds and kitchen. In a word, it was perfect. We loved it so much we raced home from farmer's market and shopping to just be in the house. Instead of roaming out to parks and beaches we explored our beach, clambering over boulders, finding sea stars and watching the birds and the boats.

The place down the road had corgis, two of whom appeared on our deck each evening. They surprised us the first time, galloping up on their short little legs, big ears flying. They were all smiles and hello-bounces. As soon as they'd greeted each of us they flew back through the woods to their own place.

We cooked long, luscious meals with stuff we bought at the local store and farmer's market. We ate more than we planned to. We ate pretty much non-stop the whole time, except when we stopped to talk about what we were going to eat next.

The bedrooms upstairs all had glorious views of the sea. I chose the murphy bed in the living room, never having slept in one before. It was amazing to open my eyes in the morning to a panorama of pink sky and changing sea. I was a bit scared the first night, all by myself in this big space, in an isolated house and surrounded by windows. I imagined someone creeping down our dark driveway in the middle of the night and stealing onto the deek to peer in the windows, but the corgis probably would have come over and licked him/her, so I knew I was safe. Just to be sure, I slept with 3 flashlights by my pillow. I didn't need them.

I brought Nelson the rat along. He liked it too.

We played all kinds of card and board games, and we laughed our heads off, and we missed our friend who couldn't come. We will definitely book the place again next year. It's a real treasure. So are my good friends with whom I spent this wonderful weekend.

Thursday, September 07, 2006

We're packing our bags and going, we five ladeez to our annual weekend of laughing our guts out, sitting on the beach, drinking wine in pajamas and possible air band performances, fueled by wine in pajamas. We're missing one friend who has been called away on an urgent matter, but that just means we'll have a recap/catch-up meeting in a couple of weeks, which will be fun too.

Every year, a week after school starts, the moms pack up and go away for the weekend, leaving the spouses and offspring to fend for themselves (which they do just fine). It's a time of friendship, relaxation and reconnecting after the adventures of summer and before we plunge into all of the routines and responsibilities of the school year. I would post a picture or link to our luxurious location, but it's top secret. Suffice to say, these words would all fit in the description:

ABC Television and Walt Disney have produced a docudrama miniseries called The Path to 9/11. It's scheduled to air Sunday and Monday nights. The Democrats have pointed out some lies in the show, and the rebuttals include some interesting info. The miniseries claims to be based on the findings of the 911 Commission Report. There's a storm brewing about this film and its version of the truth. This will likely result in many more people watching it.

I will skip it, but I bet a lot of people will watch it without thinking. That's what TV is for, right?

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

We rode more than a dozen extreme roller coasters on this trip. Some of them we rode a dozen times. We rode wooden and metal coaster, stand-up, sit-down, dangle-foot suspended and hang-glider position coasters. We did loops and inversions and even rode a coaster in pitch darkness so there was no idea what was coming next. Here are a couple of pictures taken by my intrepid husband, who thinks it's fun to carry a camera way up into the sky to capture the experience.